Sunday, October 28, 2007

Arty Shrink Plastic???

Can Shrink Plastic (Shrinky Dinks) be arty? Or is it merely an old-fashioned stamping product that has had it's day? Nay I Say!!!!! Shrink Plastic CAN be arty and I intend to prove this to the girls in my atc class next Saturday when we tackle the still "oooooohhhhh and aaaaaaaahhhhh" inspiring humble plastic. Yep, grown women are still just as amazed as kids, when they watch their stamped piece shrivel and shrink and curl up on itself, only to flatten out miraculously and reveal a fantastic little rendition of the larger former item.

A little experiment I tried was running some white shrink plastic through my printer (Epson with Durabrite inks). It printed out okay...if a little blurry in spots because I didn't bother to sand the shrink plastic first (like you should if you are applying colour). Just thought I'd "wing it"! You need to be really careful not to touch the colour as it doesn't dry until it's heated so cut out carefully!!! Go on...ask me how I know!!! lol One thing though, you really need to have a PALE image because as you know, the colour really intensifies as it shrinks down. Enough blabber.....on with the samples...

This one, "Relique", is one of the inkjet printer ones. It's Michelangelo's pointing hands that are the printed image and the little bits of embossing powder in the top right & left hand corner cover a smudgy finger-print from touching the print while still wet. Aren't you glad I ALWAYS tell you my mistakes! ;-)

The next atc is a stamped image that has been coloured with.....********.....no, not a typo....I can't tell you because it's a surprise for the Saturday atc girls. All will be revealed after Saturday's class. I'm doing this because I KNOW they read my blog and I can't give all my surprises away before the class. Some of them have been known to practice before the class! hahahaha The background is canvas paper that has been coloured with twinkling H2O's, very subtle colouring, and stamped with Stazon Timber Brown and a script stamp. Plus the ubiquitous German Scrap available from here. This one is "Francia".

Next up is another stamped image. It's the absolutely fabulous famous face of Lina Cavalieri, she's used on many, many stamps because quite frankly, she is just gorgeous! The two images were stamped on almond coloured shrink plastic that I sanded first, then I added colour with the glimmer chalks, (also available at Scraptivate) then stamped two sections of the stamp in black Stazon. The size of the shrink plastic before it was shrunk was the same size as an atc - 2-1/2" x 3-1/2", so this gives you some idea of how much shrinkage there really is! ERROR ALERT!!! ERROR ALERT!!! The "E" is backwards because I made a mistake...but kinda liked the look of it anyway so I did it again on the "HATE". No mistake is a mistake if you do it twice....right??? This one is called "Love/Hate"...sort of like all kinds of relationships...no?

I still have another couple of shrink plastic atc's but they will have to wait until my next post, I need to photograph them and one is at work. Will take my camera tomorrow to work and put them up soon.

Hehehehe! re the comment about the error alert, I saw these today and didn't even notice! They all look gorgeous, I wish I was doing the class, I guess I will just have to experiment by myself. Great stuff once again Kelsey!Ky

Oh, I'm dying to try shrink plastic. I've never used it, and I don't even remember seeing any in the shops. I'm afraid to start it because I have to save up a bit from my resent sprees! But, I have to tell you, these are so cool. So great! I'm going to make ATCs with this as soon as I can.HCIT?!Chris

I'm not sure if "anonymous" above will check back here but I'm going to answer her question anyway. Shrink plastic is supposed to flatten out afterwards, stampers help it along by pressing it flat with an acrylic block or similar.

But, you could possibly work very quickly after it is warm and place it around a wooden rod while it cools to get the shape you want. I haven't tried it but if I were you I'd give it a go! You'll have to work quickly and be careful, it's hot!

Follow by Email

Translate

Search This Blog

Followers

About Me

I teach techniques in the form of Artist Trading Cards. My background was in costume design/making, then cloth sculptured dolls and finally mixed media and stamping. I'm a technique junkie, can't get enough of playing with different products to see what will happen.